


Used to the Darkness

by Gloomier



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, ROOT Kakashi, Suspense
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-25 02:49:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22328701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gloomier/pseuds/Gloomier
Summary: ROOT is Konoha's dark side, a frightening eidolon of the good ideals that the village represents. Darker still is what Danzo has kept hidden in the depths of ROOT's compound for seven years.Kakashi would have to realize at some point that he may have gotten in over his head... Right?
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka
Comments: 44
Kudos: 125
Collections: KakaIru 2019 Mini Bingo!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hmm finally getting to my kakairu bingo fics. This is for the prompt "bring me to light" (I'll add the card later). 
> 
> Going to aim for around 2 to 3 chapters, we'll see out of control this gets.
> 
> Many thank you's to ladyxxdaydream & MagnusTesla for their support and help!

Some days Kakashi regretted affiliating himself with ROOT.

They didn’t operate too much differently than ANBU did, but its soldiers were cold, empty killing machines. He couldn’t rely on them to have his back like an ANBU team, ‘ _there is only the mission’_ one of his ROOT squad had once told him in an emotionless monotone voice. If it came down to completing a mission and saving a teammate, Kakashi knew that any other ROOT operative would have left him to his fate.

He hadn’t been sent out on a mission since his failed assassination attempt on Sarutobi Hiruzen—a mission he didn’t wish to dwell on too much. There was just too much there; too many sour memories and hurt feelings compelling him to do Danzo’s bidding for a chance at some sort of closure. Kakashi was beginning to discover that whatever closure (revenge) he was seeking wasn’t worth whatever the _Shadow Hokage_ was scheming.

As it stood, Kakashi was going stir crazy. He was stuck in the ROOT compound on guard duty for various assets, both alive and not.

Tonight he was on the rotation for the operation’s most permanent asset. It was apparently a creature so dangerous that it required round the clock guard posting, an impenetrable door made from rare metal alloys, and some of the most intricate fūinjutsu seals Kakashi had ever seen.

Kakashi stood next to the door in question, directly across from the ROOT operative designated Cat. 

He was a few hours into his shift, the boredom was starting to gnaw at his sanity and the corridor was unnervingly silent. The other thing he hated about being part of ROOT was that he couldn’t read Icha Icha Paradise on duty, which was such a shame because he just discovered it and the plot was starting to ramp up.

“So, do you know what’s in there?” Kakashi asked, only to wince at how loud he sounded against the deathly quiet.

Kakashi knew better than to ask, but between the irritation, boredom, and the silence he couldn’t help it. Not that he would admit to it, Kakashi was also curious about what required so much security down here. Was it a weapon? Did it pose some apocalyptic threat to the village? Was Danzo hoping to overthrow the Hokage with whatever was behind the door?

“It does not concern us.” came the cool, clipped reply.

“Aren’t you the least bit curious about what’s hidden behind the door?” Kakashi insisted.

“No,” Cat said tersely. It was probably the most emotion Kakashi had ever heard from the kid—and he was most certainly a kid. Cat couldn’t have been any more than sixteen or seventeen to Kakashi’s twenty-one. “We don’t have clearance to know what’s in there, so stop asking Hound.”

“Maa, you’re no fun, Cat. You should live a little, being a stick in the mud isn’t very exciting,” Kakashi teased him.

The corridor fell silent again. Kakashi still had several hours standing here like a goddamn statue. He would have to consider getting the fuck out of ROOT if he wanted to be doing actual work. Hell, he’d give up being a shinobi, leave the village, and become a farmer. At least that would be more exciting and productive than guarding a door.

“He’s been down here for several years now.”

Cat’s voice was so quiet Kakashi almost thought he was dreaming it.

_“He?”_

So it was a creature, then. A _He._ But was the _He_ a human?

Kakashi swallowed thickly. Could it be Naruto? Kakashi hadn’t seen his sensei’s son in years, not since he’d been recruited into ROOT. He regretted not being able to do anything for Naruto. Kakashi had been a kid sailing on a sea of his own psychological issues—which had changed little over the years if he was being honest—and was not fit to raise a child.

“The boy in that containment room. He was brought down here shortly after I began going out on missions. He killed a lot of people trying to escape, or so I heard,” Cat explained.

“How long ago was that? Was it… Was it before the Nine-Tails attack, or after?” Kakashi asked quietly, his voice threatening to crack with concern. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if it was Naruto locked up down here like a rabid animal.

“Hm. About six or seven years ago—so after.”

Naruto would have still been too young, only three years old and still under Hiruzen’s watchful eye. He’d be around nine years old now.

Kakashi released a relieved, shaky breathe probably loud enough that Cat had heard it. Cat, thankfully, didn’t comment. 

So, not Naruto. Thank the gods.

Not wanting to lose the chance to ask questions, Kakashi asked one more, “Does _he_ have a name?”

There was a brief silence, Kakashi guessed Cat was debating with himself about whether to tell Kakashi or not. As it dragged on, Kakashi assumed that Cat decided not to tell him. He was ready to drop the subject entirely, but Cat continued to surprise him.

“His name is Iruka.”

_Iruka._

The name haunted Kakashi when his guard shift came to an end. It echoed ominously in his mind as he slept and as he completed the menial tasks around the compound. What did Iruka do to end up in the bowels of Konoha’s underground? Who was he? Was he someone from outside the village? Outside of Fire Country? Was he someone from within the village? What _was_ he? What did ROOT want him for?

Since his guard shift with Cat a week ago, Kakashi dreamed of the cell's metal door.

Kakashi was always standing before it, staring at it for what seemed like an eternity before he reached out to touch it. The metal would liquefy beneath his hand, and a pitch-black void consumed him. Kakashi always tried desperately to find his bearings, only to catch a pair of menacing amber eyes glaring back at him—their intensity pierced Kakashi's very soul. The heavy, foreboding atmosphere suffocated him with fear and anxiety every time. Just as his instinct to run reached its fever pitch, Kakashi woke up covered in sweat and panting heavily, body wracked with tremors.

The dreams felt real, and Kakashi couldn’t seem to shake the sense of existential dread and unease that gripped him and continued to affect him two weeks since the guard posting.

It wasn’t until he cornered Cat that he finally understood.

“The dreams? They’re… _normal,”_ Cat admitted slowly like he wasn’t quite sure if he believed it to be a _normal_ occurrence.

“You’ve had them too, then?”

“Everyone gets them, it’s why the guard rotation is changed so often,” Cat explained. “ Iruka is the one doing it, and no matter what kind of seals and barriers we’ve put up, it doesn’t stop the dreams. The longer you’re in the vicinity of Iruka’s cell, the closer you are to the room, the worse the dreams are.”

It explained why that entire block was completely devoid of living beings. It wasn’t a small area either.

“Why is there even a guard rotation then?” Kakashi asked, feeling a little frustrated with the stupidity of it all. “What’s the point if Iruka does this to people? Is his confinement not good enough as is?”

“You can’t defend against something you know nothing about. He’s tried to escape many times over the years, or so I’ve been told. We have postings to make sure he doesn’t get out—with help or otherwise. I’ve been on guard rotation for him for two years now.”

Kakashi bit back a humorless laugh. So Iruka has been down here for years and the organization still knows next to nothing about him? And on top of that, they just let him waltz right out of his cell?

Kakashi had seen the extensive security the ROOT compound had, how could Iruka even escape?

Their masks were still covering their faces, but something in Kakashi’s body language must have tipped Cat off to his thought process.

“The dreams. Iruka can manipulate people into opening his cell. It’s been theorized that it’s exposure to whatever Iruka can do,” Cat said. “The victim dismantles the security measures, they go into the cell and release Iruka from his bonds, and then people die.”

“Is it some sort of bloodline ability?”

Cat shook his head. “It’s not a chakra based ability. He’s covered in chakra blocking seals, and as an extra precaution, his chains eat chakra.”

“So, whatever Iruka is, it’s an ability unique to him and does not have a counter.”

Cat nodded.

* * *

Iruka continued to invade Kakashi’s thoughts. Not in the intrusive way the dreams had been invading his mind, but just the thought of him. As a person and how he had been an unfortunate victim to ROOT. A thought had been noisily making itself known in the back of his mind.

What if Iruka was here against his will?

Not in the way that an enemy deserved to be locked away in the deepest darkest cell Konoha had. But in a ‘what if they were there because of Danzo’s machinations?’ sort of deal. Kakashi knew this happened more frequently in ROOT than it did outside of Danzo’s far-reaching shadow. For all his flaws, Hiruzen was still a good person; he was more compassionate and friendly than a Hokage really should be. It was what made him a good leader, or so Minato-sensei had explained.

Kakashi figured that the place to start looking would be the administration’s archives; he would use Iruka’s name as a keyword for a search. Ideally, it would pull up all information containing the name—which included the missions A-rank and above. Even ANBU level mission reports and personnel files were kept there, only separated by its own room and a shit load of specialized seals meant solely for its protection. Kakashi didn’t have the clearance level outside of ROOT, but that would hardly stop him from going to snoop.

He waited until night to infiltrate. Night-shift was smaller and easier to avoid, especially for someone like Kakashi. He used chakra paper, an explosive tag (one he had stolen from one of the night-shift paper-pushers that had a higher clearance level), and a little trick he had learned from his former ANBU captain that allowed him to key his chakra into the security wards. After that, all he had to do was pick the locks on the doors.

Kakashi slipped into one of the offices, closing the door behind him. A bulky computer monitor was sitting on the desk, powered down; the grinding hum coming from the tower quietly filled the silence of the room. He pulled out the desk chair and turned the monitor on. Kakashi was grateful that there wasn’t much to figure out—he hated using these machines.

The clack of the keys was loud, too loud, as he typed in the only name he had: Iruka; Kakashi hoped that no one would hear the noise. When he hit enter only one entry came up. It was weird, too. You’d think that in a village of thousands there would be more than one Iruka.

Iruka’s personnel file was located in the section meant for shinobi who were either killed in action or went missing. The room containing those files ended up being on the low side of the security spectrum in Kakashi’s opinion, but he supposed that dead or missing ninja were hardly a cause for the most severe protections.

The file was easy to find. Iruka’s full name was Umino Iruka and he had gone missing shortly before his thirteenth birthday—he would be around nineteen years old now. It was rather thick for a missing genin, but it made sense when almost all the pieces of paper in the folder were incident reports.

Kakashi was getting a kick out of reading all the stupid shit the kid had done, such as changing the signs on the doors of Hokage Tower or pouring dish soap in some of the fountains around Konoha.

He spent a few more minutes reading incident reports before flipping back to the front of the file, to read up on what happened to the Umino kid. He had to figure out what he was dealing with.

The missing in action report stated that Iruka had disappeared during a C-rank escort mission. It was supposed to be a simple mission: keep bandits away from the merchant heading out of Konoha and to the Capital. The only concern for the mission were bandits; the merchant’s goods had been thoroughly checked to make sure he wasn’t smuggling anything that wasn’t explicitly laid out in the manifest.

The team and the merchant had been ambushed around the half-way point of the journey, the assailants could not be IDed (as missing-nin or attackers from another village), but they were most assuredly shinobi. The team incurred only a few injuries, and both the merchant and his cargo were left alone. In the scuffle, however, Iruka had been taken.

The search for the missing genin had resulted in very little. There was no trail or body, the kidnappers made no demands, and as far as Iruka’s file was concerned, he didn’t have anything worth kidnapping him for. Iruka was very ordinary for a shinobi, so it was a very strange occurrence all around.

He didn’t know the potential power Iruka had, but there was a reason he was where he was. Kakashi was incredibly curious about the kind of information Danzo had on the kid, and where it came from as Iruka’s personnel file was empty of anything exceedingly important.

While Kakashi thought about what he’d read, he hadn’t noticed another presence in the file room with him.

“Here for a little late-night reading I see, Hound,” Hiruzen said in a grave tone, the barest hint of amusement coloring it.

The irony was not lost on Kakashi, considering this is exactly what happened the last time he was caught rifling through papers in a place he had no business being; getting caught by the same person a second time miffed him a little bit.

Kakashi tensed up and tramped down on his reflex to draw a kunai and attack. He wasn’t here to kill anyone, least of all try and kill Hiruzen again.

“I was curious,” Kakashi said, willing himself to keep his tone neutral and steady.

“Curious about a missing genin?” Hiruzen asked, his eyebrow was raised skeptically. His gaze flicked quickly down to Kakashi’s hands and then back up.

Iruka’s file was still spread open in his hand, and Hiruzen was close enough to see the report with Iruka’s name on it.

Kakashi simply nodded.

Hiruzen’s gaze sharpened, “Why Umino Iruka?”

Without missing a beat, Kakashi replied.

“I heard of him while out on a mission, and I was curious about his strange disappearance,” He lied. Lying came easy to Kakashi, and the people he lied to believed him. He prayed that Hiruzen believed him now because he didn’t think he’d be able to explain that Danzo had a Konoha genin trapped in the bowels of the ROOT compound.

“Intriguing,” Hiruzen said. Perhaps Kakashi was imagining it, but the man sounded hopeful. “If you happen to find out anything of interest, I would be very grateful to you if you shared with me what you learned.”

Hiruzen smiled at him, in that vague and knowing way of his. If Kakashi were anybody else, he would have written that expression off as nothing, but the Hokage was trying to tell him something.

Before Kakashi could contemplate the look he was given further or comment, Hiruzen turned and silently walked away, leaving Kakashi alone in the file room.

* * *

After that night in the filing room, Kakashi was finally allowed to go on several missions, which meant the mystery of Umino Iruka was set on the backburner.

Kakashi didn’t think about Iruka again until two months later when he was slated for Iruka guard duty. He expected Cat to be there, the last few weeks he and Cat had been sent out on several missions together, not to mention he was on guard duty with Kakashi the last time.

This time Kakashi was alone standing in front of the specially made door; standing in the hallway where the silence was so disquieting that Kakashi seriously considered ditching his post.

He tried to ignore the silence by pulling out his copy of Icha Icha Paradise, which had been, thankfully, left forgotten in his hip pouch. The next book wouldn’t be released until next year, so Kakashi amused himself with another rereading of the book—it was his seventh reread since he picked it up months ago.

_Mimi-chan giggled, her hand poorly smothering her laughter as she stared doe-eyed up at Yusuke._

_“It’s okay to look, you won’t get in trouble,” she whispered, “No one will know if you do it.”_

_No one will know._

The words from the book echoed alluringly in Kakashi’s head.

Cat wasn’t here to stop him from looking—and that’s all he’d be doing. Just looking.

However, there was another part of him, screaming at him not to do it. The part that still respected all the training his father and Minato had instilled within him.

 _“Kakashi, shinobi are weapons. We are tools to be used to effectively enact the will of our leaders. We do what we are told,”_ his father had once said.

Shinobi had their human curiosity conditioned out of them. Curiosity got people killed, for seeing something they shouldn’t—for knowing something they shouldn’t. Cat’s hushed voice from months ago replayed itself. Cat had shared something that should be a secret with him. Kakashi wasn’t supposed to know the asset’s name or the fact that he was in that room, to begin with.

If Kakashi got caught now, he would be in deep.

 _“You know you want to look, Kakashi,”_ Mimi-chan airily told him. _“It’s just one look, what’s the harm in that?”_

“What’s the harm in that?” Kakashi whispered.

He slipped his book back in his pouch and turned around to face the metal door. It was covered in many paper seals—whose intricate curving and curling lines confused him—and four big padlocks kept it locked tight. There was a single slat so that someone could look into the cell.

Kakashi took two steps closer to the door and reached his hand up to the knob of the slat and slid it open very slowly. He took the last step up to the door and peered in through the now open hole in the door.

There was a dim green light illuminating a small area of the cell beyond. Iruka was kneeling in the middle of it with his head bowed forward and long hair falling around his face. His arms were pulled behind his back, and Kakashi could see the silhouette of the chains keeping Iruka’s arms bound. A collar was secured around Iruka’s neck with another series of chains hooked to the rings of it and bolted to the floor; the chains were pulled taut, keeping Iruka down in his kneeling position. It seemed Danzo wasn’t taking any more chances with whatever Iruka could do because he was also blindfolded and gagged.

Kakashi wasn’t ignorant of how prisoners were subdued, but even he couldn’t deny the cruelty this kid must have endured growing up down here in a dark cell, isolated and chained up like some rabid beast.

Unthinkingly, Kakashi bumped his head into the door, the porcelain of his mask clanging against metal echoed loudly through the hall and into Iruka’s cell.

Iruka’s head snapped up, his chains jingled softly under the swift movement.

Kakashi’s heart jumped into his throat, and he held his breath. Although Iruka was blindfolded, Kakashi got the feeling Iruka was staring at him through the cloth.

He _knew_ Kakashi was standing there watching him.

When the panic and dread became too much to bear, Kakashi slammed the slat closed.

The rest of his shift was spent trying to calm himself down by mentally reciting every kata he knew.

* * *

The nightmares that plagued him after his first Iruka shift could not compare to the ones that tortured him this time around.

The dreams weren’t so obscure and harmlessly ominous as they once were.

Sometimes Kakashi would open Iruka’s cell door and a tsunami of blood would crash over him, sweep him away, and drown him. Other times, Kakashi would free Iruka and he would die—every single one of his deaths more gruesome and bloody than the last. A few rare occurrences had Kakashi trapped as Iruka was: chained up, wasting away, and _starving._ The hunger he felt in the dreams was more agonizing than any pain Kakashi had ever endured. He didn’t think he’d ever feel anything like it either.

Kakashi began to dread going to sleep.

Missions helped to distract him, but he was on edge and his lack of sleep was starting to make him sloppy and jumpy. Not enough to make him a liability, but enough for Cat to pick up on it. The kid never said anything about it, but the pointed looks thrown his way was enough of a tell.

He was beginning to think the dreams would never fade, they went on for a full month—two weeks longer than last time—before finally going away.

* * *

Knowing Iruka was in that cell and seeing him were two extremely different feelings.

On one hand, Kakashi could more easily ignore the fact that there was a living and breathing human being underneath all of that security. On the other, he now knew what Danzo thought of his assets.

Kakashi couldn’t, in good conscience, not do anything about it.

So when Danzo had to leave the compound, and Konoha, on urgent business, Kakashi seized the opportunity to go snooping through the man’s stuff.

It was tricky business breaking into Danzo’s office, but lucky for him he had an eye that gave him an edge. He would have to make doubly sure to put the defenses back in place on his way out, but it wouldn’t be an issue with his photographic memory thanks to the Sharingan.

The office itself was as austere as the man himself. It lacked any sort of decoration; the shelves were neat and sorted in no discernable way that made sense to Kakashi; the desk was cleared of any sort of clutter.

The organization and cleanliness meant that it would be easier to figure out if anyone was in the office tampering with things they should not be.

Kakashi carefully picked his way through the shelves first. He let his Sharingan gloss over the first bookcase, and when he was convinced there were no chakra-charged traps, he carefully pulled a tome and flipped the cover open, paging through it. It was full of words and numbers that meant nothing to Kakashi. It was probably a coded ledger, but he didn’t have the key (nor the skills) to decrypt it. It wasn’t what he was looking for anyway. He shut the book and returned it to its place, making sure it looks just the way it had before he pulled it.

Kakashi took a few steps and pulled another book off the next shelf and studied it in the manner as the previous one. Another coded ledger filled with just numbers he didn't understand. Kakashi resisted his urge to throw the book and instead returned it to its spot on the shelf, growling silently.

He knew now without pulling every book off the shelf they would all be the same. Two different books off of two separate bookcases both with the similarly coded garble.

No.

Even if he knew the key to decrypt the books, all that information would be extraneous to his actual mission. While they most certainly would implicate Danzo in all kinds of monumentally abhorrent bullshit, none of it would help him to understand what made Iruka so special to capture the interest of someone like Danzo in the first place. So special that he needed to be locked away with some serious restraints. Not just the typical stuff used by T&I and ANBU—but seriously complicated seals that only a master fūinjutsu master would know (and he didn’t think Konoha had any more of those at the moment), and materials that were usually wildly out of budget for any division.

Not to mention Danzo hadn't disposed of Iruka.

That told Kakashi that Danzo had a use for him eventually; maybe not now but sometime in the future. That was a frightening thought.

If any files on Iruka still existed within this space, and if Danzo considered him a prize worth keeping, then that meant the files were somewhere not out in the open for someone like Kakashi (or Hiruzen) to stumble upon.

“The desk maybe?” Kakashi mused quietly out loud.

He shifted his focus to the desk.

While the bookcases we not layered with extra defenses—Danzo believing his coded books were safe enough as they were—the desk was completely covered in them. It was a bright spot in the dim room and it thrummed menacingly with all the chakra that had been pushed into it.

Kakashi was thankful that Danzo would be gone for a week. It took him a few hours of picking through the chakra threads of defensive seals to get just one side of the desk’s drawers open. Danzo seemed arrogant enough to believe no one would be able to bust into his heavily-warded belongings. When Kakashi was determined, nothing short of death could stop him from achieving his goals.

Unlike the stuff on the shelves, Kakashi discovered that the files in the drawers were not in the same unintelligible code as the books on the shelves. Kakashi carefully pulled each folder out one by one and looked through their contents.

The papers within the folders were written vaguely, but there was enough vague information to piece together that these were _human_ experiments.

> _Subject #221874 injected with serum J-002941._
> 
> _No clear reactions were noted after inoculation, the desired outcome was inconclusive._
> 
> _One hour into the observation phase, the subject suffered a severe seizure and fell into a comatose state._
> 
> _The subject was later terminated at the end of the three day waiting period._

The reports in the folders after reading the first were all similar—all failed. There were easily a hundred or more files in this drawer alone. Kakashi didn’t want to think about what Danzo was experimenting with. It stank of Orochimaru.

Kakashi was starting to go stir crazy by the time he got to the second drawer when he stumbled upon it.

> _Threat Level: SSS-Class_
> 
> _Asset #11850 is known to be highly aggressive toward personnel._
> 
> _As of this report Asset #11850 has successfully escaped containment three times, with an increasing number of casualties each escape attempt due to inexplicable abilities. Attempts to put them under long term genjutsu have failed; other means of keeping them subdued are being researched._

Kakashi flipped through the rest of the pages in the file—they were all rather underwhelming. He expected something more substantial besides generic comments written so clinically that it made Kakashi’s skin itch. Thankfully it seemed no extensive experimentation was done to Iruka—Danzo hadn’t found a way to safely keep the hazard down to take advantage of Iruka’s talents.

“All that work for nothing,” Kakashi murmured unhappily and sighed. “People have gone to great lengths to hide whatever it is that you are, Umino Iruka.”

He wouldn’t get anything more from Danzo, which meant paying a visit to the Hokage for information. The old man knew something too.

If that was the case, then Kakashi would kill two birds with one stone.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More pieces are added to the puzzle.

After Kakashi had attempted to kill the Hokage, ANBU had developed an extreme paranoia for him.

Kakashi’s reputation served as a boogeyman for the organization. So when he entered the Hokage Tower late in the afternoon the next day and marched up to the Hokage’s office— _politely_ asking for an audience with the man—Kakashi wasn’t surprised to be met with low-burning killing intent and weapons drawn against him.

Honestly, Kakashi was surprised that Hiruzen had brushed off the entire debacle as he had. If it was anyone else that attempted it, they would have either been killed or detained by T&I indefinitely. Yet Kakashi was both allowed to live and continue to operate under ROOT.

The two ANBU guards at the door hadn’t budged, and Kakashi couldn’t help but tilt his head to the side in amusement.

A small burst of chakra pulsed from inside the office, alerting the guard that he was allowed to pass. Kakashi watched as both ANBU hesitated at the silent command.

Kakashi waited patiently; a minute passed, and then another but neither guard seemed keen on moving aside for Kakashi to enter. He knew he shouldn’t find the situation amusing, but here he was.

“Maa, I don’t mean to be rude but I think that I’ve been allowed in,” Kakashi said pointing at the door behind them, not bothering to be subtle about his teasing or hide the amusement in his voice.

Mongoose snarled, “If you so much as look at the Hokage the wrong way—”

“—You’ll kill me?” Kakashi smoothly interrupted. “How will you know if you’re standing out here?” he goaded them.

“Fuck off, I’ll just kill you right now, _traitor!”_ Mongoose growled, taking a threatening step forward and brandishing their sword in Kakashi’s direction.

Wow, they really let anyone into ANBU these days, and so easy to rile up—you’d think they were freshly minted chuunin with a chip on their shoulder. Some days Kakashi enjoyed being able to antagonize people like this. The high-strung shinobi made it so easy.

“He’s been allowed in,” Bear said with infinite patience and exasperation, catching Mongoose by the arm before they advanced any further.

Kakashi wanted to provoke the ANBU guard further, but the door to the office swung open suddenly, revealing another ANBU.

“Enough!” the new ANBU commanded harshly.

Mongoose obeyed and relaxed enough to allow Bear to drag them down the corridor and away from Kakashi.

The ANBU, Kingfisher, now that Kakashi looked at the design on their mask, watched the pair until they disappeared, then looked over at Kakashi.

Kakashi and Kingfisher stared at each other for a good minute, and Kakashi knew he was being assessed. This ANBU was a captain, one that wouldn’t put up with any of Kakashi’s regular bullshit. Kakashi read the silent warning before Kingfisher stepped back and to the side, opening the door wider for Kakashi to step through.

Hiruzen was sitting behind his desk, arms laying on top of it with his hands folded together. There was a grave expression on his face as he studied Kakashi.

Kakashi composed himself and walked forward until he was in the middle of the room, then he dropped to a knee and bowed respectfully, waiting to be addressed.

After a moment of tense silence, the Hokage spoke up.

“Hound.”

“Hokage-sama,” Kakashi replied and rose.

“To what do I owe this pleasure?” Hiruzen asked.

Kakashi looked at the spots around the office where he knew ANBU were stationed, then looked back at Hiruzen, who had narrowed his gaze at Kakashi’s movements.

“Do you trust everyone in this office with what we spoke of last time we met?” Kakashi asked cryptically.

There was a brief pause before Hiruzen dipped his head, “Yes, Hound, I trust them.”

“Very well,” Kakashi said. “I have a few questions and one request.”

“Alright,” Hiruzen allowed, eyes sparkling with interest, “What would you ask of me?”

“I would like access to the Hokage’s library. _Guarded,_ if that would soothe nerves.”

There was a ripple of upset chakra in the room for half a second before it deadened.

Hiruzen didn’t react to it and instead asked, “You have a reason, I gather?”

“Yes. I’ve come across some fūinjutsu I’ve never seen before in regards to Umino Iruka, and I would like access to any texts that might help me decipher their use.” One of the spots where an ANBU stood at attention quivered at the mention of Iruka. Someone who knew him, Kakashi concluded and stored that information away for later. “I think they will be important eventually.”

Hiruzen sat back in his chair and studied Kakashi again, trying to discern the meaning of his explanation.

It was too early for Kakashi to show all his cards, but it seemed he didn’t have to just yet.

“I will grant your request—” Hiruzen began to say, and then Kingfisher, who was standing behind Kakashi since he had entered the room, interrupted him.

“Hokage-sama, with all due respect, I don’t think that’s a good idea considering Hound’s recent history.”

Honestly? Fair. If Kakashi was in Kingfisher’s shoes, he would bring up the same concerns. To them, Kakashi was a huge security risk. Letting him have access to the library? A bigger security risk, especially as that was where many of Konoha’s secrets were kept.

“I thank you for your good opinion, Kingfisher, but in this matter, I trust Hound will not step a toe out of line,” Hiruzen said pointedly. It was a thinly veiled threat, and Kakashi heard it loud and clear. “Viper will accompany him during his study time, and none of the texts will be allowed to leave the room.”

Yet Kakashi would be able to copy anything relevant with his Sharingan and take it with him when he left. The room prevented any jutsu ranked above E from being cast. His eye technically wasn’t a jutsu in the normal sense and therefore was not bound by the laws of the seals placed over the room. A loophole he was sure Hiruzen already considered before making the allowance.

Viper, who was in the spot that had moved only a moment ago, revealed themselves and stepped toward the Hokage’s desk in compliance.

“With that sorted… You said you had questions, Hound?”

“Umino Iruka was abducted, but his file showed he had nothing of interest or worth stealing, to begin with. Why would an ordinary genin be kidnapped during a C-rank escort mission? What wasn’t listed in his file?”

Hiruzen frowned deeply as he mulled over Kakashi’s question, carefully weighing the decision to speak the information out loud.

“His mother and father were refugees from another country, who sought asylum here in Konoha when they felt they were no longer safe in their former home. No, I cannot reveal where they came from.” Hiruzen amended, clearly knowing what Kakashi was thinking. “They were a very special family, with powerful abilities.”

“And did anyone besides you know about them?” Kakashi prodded.

“Three people knew about them. Minato, Danzo, and myself.”

Kakashi’s chest tightened hearing his sensei’s name, and his stomach churned hearing Danzo’s. All three of them were kages, even if one of them was self-proclaimed.

It wasn’t hard then, to put together the series of events that led to this point.

Iruka’s family moved here, then told Hiruzen their secret, who in turn had to tell the next Hokage, Minato, as well as the man that Hiruzen called a friend—among other things. Danzo probably worked for years trying to find a way to sway Iruka’s parents into his organization, to manipulate whatever power they held. That man was always looking for an edge, but they no doubt refused, so he had to find alternative means to get what they had.

Kakashi imagined that Danzo couldn’t have been happier that Iruka had been born, probably threw a party after the Nine-Tails attack and Iruka’s parents were killed in action. It was exactly what he needed to get close to that family. Being a relatively new genin and getting sent out on missions outside of the village—outside of Hiruzen’s protection—would have made Iruka easy pickings. No one would know that they needed to be alert.

“But they also had enemies. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that whatever drove them from their former home followed them here as well.” Hiruzen added in Kakashi’s silence.

 _You don’t believe that, do you?_ Kakashi wanted to say.

Instead, he shrugged and said, “It’s possible.”

Hiruzen stared at him, but Kakashi stared right back, unwilling to give anything away. Now wasn’t the time. 

“Do you have any further questions?”

“No, Hokage-sama,” Kakashi said. “I’d like to get started on my research if that’s alright?”

Hiruzen nodded.

Kakashi bowed deeply and did an about-face, walking past Kingfisher as he strode to the door.

“Keep me informed, Hound,” Hiruzen called as Kakashi pulled the door open.

He waved and dipped around the corner.

Viper's muffled footsteps followed him down the corridor.

* * *

Kakashi had only been in the Hokage’s library once before with Minato-sensei.

When you imagined a library, you expected a big room filled with shelves upon shelves of books. His kid self expected a lot of books, the Hokage had to of had a lot of secrets to protect after all. The actual room was about as big as the Hatake library.

It had hardly changed over the years.

Viper took up a post in one of the corners that had a good view of both the only entry into the room and Kakashi.

Kakashi spared the ANBU a glance as he walked up to a thin wooden filing cabinet, opening the first drawer. None of the stuff in this library was allowed to be in any of the computers, but it still needed to be organized.

Kakashi’s fingers traced over the tabs of little index cards, checking each for what he was looking for. As he perused the drawers he saw tabs for countries, villages, people, and clans. Some tabs were left blank, either on purpose or made in a way only the Hokage could reveal what they said (the index cards marked by blank tabs were also blank themselves). There were also tabs for tailed beasts, forbidden jutsu, and equipment.

Finally, he came upon the tab that marked the texts for fūinjutsu. They were only seven, but two of the cards were marked with swirls that denoted their village of origin—Uzushio.

Kakashi went and pulled them off their shelf, Viper didn’t move from their spot. He dumped them on the table, pulled out a chair, and began reading.

Kakashi never liked seals. He acknowledged their usefulness, the support they offered was strong and dependable, but they couldn’t be used effectively in close combat. They were often used by a long-range-designated person on a team that had to be protected. Kakashi wasn’t a support shinobi; he was a close to mid-range fighter more often than not and his style couldn’t rely on a fighting style that required him to write seals on the fly.

He wasn’t very good at making seals even if he _could_ write them on the fly during active combat. Kakashi had a basic concept of them, and as much as Kushina tried to tutor him on them, he never had the focus or the neat handwriting for it. He did, however, learn how to identify them and the different calligraphy styles each country tended to use.

The calligraphy style that made up the seals on Iruka’s cell door was that of Konoha, that much he was certain. As he paged through the first book, nothing looked familiar but Kakashi used his eye to copy everything all the same.

When he was done, Kakashi shut the book and set it on the far corner of the table, then picked another book off the top of the pile.

He was halfway through the new book when Viper broke the silence.

“Do you know what happened to Iruka?” they asked quietly. There was a tight edge to her voice as she spoke. It made Kakashi wonder if it was contempt for him, having the audacity to ask anything of Sandaime after he had almost killed the man. Or perhaps it was a cautious, tiny spark of hope igniting.

At any rate, their voice was familiar to Kakashi. What was the name again?

Akemi?

“I heard about him while out on a mission,” Kakashi answered with the lie he had fed Hiruzen.

Akane?

“That’s not what I asked.” Viper snipped back icily.

Aneko?

“No, I don’t know what happened to Iruka.”

Anzu?

“Then what do seals have to do with him?”

Anko? _Anko._

 _Yeah,_ that sounded like the one. Mitarashi Anko, who was loud and obsessed with dango. Her family owned that really popular dango shop on the main street. 

Kakashi sighed, turning a page.

She had been a part of Iruka’s genin team, along with some kid named Mizuki.

“I’m not sure,” Kakashi answered as he turned another page. “But they have something to do with him. Why does he matter to you?”

There was a pause, and for a moment Kakashi had assumed she wasn’t going to answer. She wouldn’t do anything she didn’t want, and Kakashi guessed Iruka was still a sore spot for her, considering how she reacted only a minute ago.

“He was the little brother I never had. The mission wasn’t supposed to go down like _that,_ he was finally starting to get over his parent’s deaths. He was going to be a great ninja.” Anko said, her voice cracking at the last word.

Kakashi never dealt with emotional people if he didn’t have to, it was weird for him. He didn’t know how to react, didn’t even know how to console them. No one ever told Kakashi that things were going to be okay after his father had killed himself. They weren’t okay at all. Kakashi never really expected to have people care about Iruka either, and so far it wasn’t just the Hokage that was interested in Iruka, but Anko as well.

How many more people were there in the village that actually gave a shit about a missing orphan?

“Sometimes missions just go pear-shaped,” Kakashi offered the flimsy excuse, hoping to have the conversation drop.

It had the opposite effect, and it was immediate.

 _“That_ mission shouldn’t have!” She thundered, her chakra spiking in anger. “The intel was all good, the client was _clean,_ then out of fucking nowhere, we get ambushed. They didn’t raise a single blade to that pompous asshole of a merchant!”

Kakashi looked up from the book and turned his head to look at Anko. She was ready to kick his ass right then and there.

“Why do you think the ambushers went for Iruka?” Kakashi asked, changing the path of the conversation in an attempt to calm Anko down. It was also an attempt to get more information, as the Hokage didn’t seem keen on telling Kakashi everything about Iruka. Asking one of Iruka’s teammates would give him more.

Anko, though still visibly upset, made an effort to compose herself.

“Iruka was always a prankster, always doing dumb shit for the fun of it,” she said, “But then after we ended up on a team together he managed to get me and Mizuki involved too, but Mizuki was a bastard with a stick shoved pretty far up his ass. It was just me and Iruka most of the time.”

Kakashi shifted his attention back to the book he was studying. “Mizuki didn’t like either of you?” he asked.

“I don’t know what that asshole’s problem was, but he didn’t seem to like me much, and Iruka less so.”

They probably had awful teamwork, Kakashi thought as he turned another page.

“Anyway, Iruka was really good at pranks, he rarely got caught, always managed to escape—that happened a lot even before we ever got thrown together. Genin and pre-genin don’t get to learn travel techniques like shunshin until chuunin rank, yet that turd seemed to disappear and reappear whenever he wanted.” Anko snickered.

That was true enough. Shunshin required a lot more chakra than your average genin would have. Even if a genin or pre-genin possessed—through some wild stroke of genetic luck—the ability to perform the jutsu, it was not sanctioned by the village unless in an emergency. It kept the kids both safe and out of trouble. It was for the same reason that kids weren’t taught to walk on water and vertical surfaces until they had a jounin sensei.

Kakashi had been one of the few children that not only had the prerequisite skill but the chakra ability to boot. Also, his dad didn’t give a shit—not with the international powder-keg that was waiting to blow at the time.

Iruka was getting a little more interesting with each person he talked to.

“And?” Kakashi grunted and turned another page. “Did you ever find out how he managed it?”

“I caught that little twerp painting swears and stick figures doing naughty things on the walls outside Tower,” Anko managed to get out before she began cackling.

Kakashi sighed and closed the book, setting it aside to grab the next one on the pile. This one was one of the Uzushio seal books. He opened it and continued reading, waiting for Anko to get a hold of herself as she laughed herself silly.

A solid five minutes later Anko’s laughter turned to chuckling snorts.

“Are you done yet?” Kakashi asked wearily as he studied a particularly confusing curl in a seal.

“Don’t be an asshole,” Anko sniped back. 

Kakashi looked up at her and said nothing.

Anko sighed and walked over to the table, then pulled the other chair opposite of Kakashi out and plopped down into it. “Fine. I was supposed to drag him to the meeting place, but that doofus handed me a can of spray paint and managed to get me in on it.”

“Hmm someone else caught you both in the act, didn’t they?” Kakashi asked.

“Ha, I wish!” Anko said, “I didn’t even realize anyone was there. One second Iruka was drawing a dick on the wall, and the next thing I know there’s angry yelling at me and a cloud of mist swirling around where Iruka had been standing. I could barely see it, it was so translucent.”

Wait, what?

Kakashi wasn’t known as the master of a thousand jutsu for no reason, but even he had never heard of such an incredible ability. The picture he was piecing together still made very little sense to Kakashi, but so far it seemed he was right in thinking Iruka had a lot of neat tricks at his disposal.

Kakashi put his book down and stared at Anko incredulously. “Iruka just turned to mist? You didn’t feel a burst of chakra or anything?”

“Maybe it was more of a fog?” Anko shrugged. “Not entirely sure to be honest. I didn’t have any idea he was going to do that… whatever it was. But Iruka managed to escape, and I got a week of helping out in the tower right along with cleaning up the mess we left on the wall.”

Kakashi snorted and picked the book back up to continue looking through it. “Sounds like he really was going to be an amazing shinobi.” 

“He would’ve been the best of us,” Anko said wistfully. Kakashi heard the sorrow in her voice. “I should have done something to save him.”

His fingers tightened around the book. Kakashi understood that feeling of helplessness so deeply. He should have tried harder to save Obito and Rin. Maybe if he had been quicker Obito wouldn’t have gotten crushed to death. If he had tracked down Rin faster, then she wouldn’t have been made a living bomb, and she wouldn’t have forced him to kill her.

Obito’s eye was threatening to cry just thinking about them.

This had all began out of stupid curiosity, but now he had to do something for Iruka. He was in a good position to help, and Kakashi knew that he had to help out the people that cared about Iruka. It was the right thing to do. It was what a Konoha shinobi should do. It’s what both his father and Minato-sensei would have done.

He owed it to all of those people to do the right thing.

Kakashi cleared his throat, willing his emotions to settle. “If there’s a chance that Iruka is out there, then I promise to do all I can to save him.”

It was stupid to make such a promise, there was no—

Oh. Well, _hello there!_

Kakashi stared hard down at the page he had just turned to, completely missing whatever it was Anko was telling him.

He recognized this particular seal structure as one that was on Iruka’s cell door. He would know for sure when he looked at the seals again. It made a lot of sense now, that parts of the seals would be in the Uzushio books, Danzo had access to anything he pleased. Uzushio produced some of the most amazing seals the world had ever seen, and they were astoundingly powerful.

If he could figure out the seal matrices used and find their anchor points, then he could very well crack them. He may actually have a chance in hell—

“You found something, didn’t you?” Anko asked, voice trembling with excitement.

Kakashi looked up at her, “I think I did.”

“I’m holding you to your promise, Hound. You had better bring him back.”

 _I promise, even if it kills me, I will bring Iruka back to the light,_ Kakashi thought silently.

* * *

Kakashi waited a week before fiddling with Iruka’s guard shift schedule. Whatever missions Danzo was sending ROOT operatives out for was working in Kakashi’s favor. The next several days only had a single guard instead of the regular two.

Hopefully, the information he copied from the books on Uzushio seals would help him pick apart the ones on Iruka’s cell door. He would have several hours to stare at the door and figure them out.

When it was time for his guard shift, he relieved a ROOT operative wearing a rodent-themed mask. He waited a solid hour and a half to make sure he was truly alone before he turned to look at the seals.

Without needing the Sharingan, Kakashi identified most of the smaller paper seals on the door as explosive seals. They were special in the way that they had a controlled blast to keep from bringing the entire block down.

Those would be easy to dismantle.

Well, they should have been easy to dismantle…

As soon as Kakashi’s hand came close to the door next to an explosive seal, it began to glow ominously.

Kakashi jerked back, and he let out a relieved sigh when the glow of the seal dimmed. They were triggered by proximity. That was _neat;_ a controlled blast and proximity trigger rolled into one tag.

So they wouldn’t be _that_ easy to dismantle. That was good, Kakashi was starting to believe Danzo wasn’t taking this seriously.

Kakashi took a step back and looked at the small seals now. They were placed in such a way that someone wanting to look in on Iruka through the slat wouldn’t trigger the seals. Kakashi was infinitely glad for that because he barely spared them a glance the first time. Huge fucking mistake, and he was sorely tempted to summon a shadow clone to smack him for his stupidity.

New plan then...

The typical ways to nullify proximity seal mines were to either: purposefully trigger them—oftentimes proximity explosives were used against the shinobi that placed them—or make counter seals that would disarm them.

Kakashi couldn’t purposefully trigger them for the obvious reasons. Making counter seals was quick and he could safely place them over the explosives as the counter seals would stick the explosive like magnets.

Aside from the small explosive seals, there was a large paper seal fixed right above the four locks on the door and its latch—covering the tiny crevice where the door met its frame. Whoever tried to pick the locks would have their faces pretty close to it. This one was also a lot more complicated than the explosives. 

After staring at the big paper seal for a couple of minutes, eyes tracing the curving lines and deciphering their meanings with what he copied from the library, Kakashi concluded that it would trigger a genjutsu if someone tried to fuck with the door. The locks were the trigger and unlocking more than one would turn you into a vegetable until someone came and found you.

That one would take a bit more finesse than the explosives.

Before he added anything extra to the door, Kakashi opened his Sharingan to look at the rest of it. Kakashi’s eye was immediately drawn to the bright purple seals directly written into the door, running around its edges. The frame the door was set in also seemed to have been treated the same way, but the seals on it and the door were different in their construction it looked like.

They had not been visible without the Sharingan and he was getting dizzy just looking at their configuration.

Well… This was going to take a while.

* * *

Kakashi spent the rest of his shift staring at the seals.

It had been exhaustive work, and he ended up using his Sharingan more than he liked, but he was making some steady headway. Kushina would have been proud.

Kakashi made sure he was back in position before the next operative came to relieve him of guard duty. He all but dragged his exhausted ass back to the barracks, peeled his clothes off, and curled up under the sheet he had for a blanket.

He awoke some hours later, body aching in ways that he hadn’t experienced in years. Bone-deep exhaustion made him sluggish; he’d gladly sleep another twelve hours.

Kakashi shifted, his arm catching on something as he tried to move it into a better position. It had gone numb when he had laid on it. He pulled harder, but his arm wouldn’t give. Kakashi opened his eyes to see what the issue was, only his sight was met with blackness. His muttered “what the fuck?” came out muffled and unintelligible—he’d been gagged with a solid object.

He struggled blindly against the unseen force, listening to the jangle of chains as he tried to move around to stand up. He could barely wiggle around as it was, there was something closed tight around his neck. Every time he moved his body in any direction Kakashi would nearly strangle himself. Or maybe the metal collar was constricting around his neck, it was impossible to tell. He was stuck up-right and in a kneeling position with his arms were trapped behind his back.

Kakashi’s heart thudded painfully in his chest as he began to panic. Had Danzo found out what he was doing? Did Cat tattle on him?

He felt extremely vulnerable. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t speak. The dull ache in his shoulders progressively worsened all while the metal of restraints pressed unforgivingly into the skin of his bare arms. Kakashi had been captured a few times on missions in the past, but never had he been in this kind of position before. Kakashi refused to let himself become a chained animal.

Cool air bit against his skin where he had begun to sweat due to his exertion. He needed to escape, it wasn’t too late to get Hiruzen in the loop now that he had been found out.

Kakashi tried to steady his breathing so he wouldn't start hyperventilating, but it seemed like his lungs couldn’t pull in enough air as he breathed steadily through his nose, but eventually, his body began to calm down. It was eerily silent outside of his now-calm breathing and the quiet ringing in his ears.

Then the hairs on the back of his head stood on end, and his skin began to prickle with goosebumps. There was another presence in the room with him, staring at him. He fought hard against his body falling into panic mode, especially when his fight or flight instinct was screaming at him to run. He could do nothing but sit and wait for whatever would happen next.

Whoever it was that was there with him had an ominous aura, it filled Kakashi with dread. There was no escape, and he doubted there would be anyone to save his ass last minute. He would die here, chained up and alone.

The presence quickly closed in and Kakashi’s stomach dropped while his heart threatened to beat right out of his chest.

Just as he felt a hand close around his throat, Kakashi’s body jerked and he was heaving himself up off the bed. His heart was beating furiously, and his right arm and shoulder were tingling with numbness.

“Holy fuck!” Kakashi whispered breathlessly, hysteria coloring his voice.

The same dread that he had felt in his nightmare had followed him back into the real world. None of the dreams he had up until this point had felt so… so _visceral._ They were all horrifying in their own way, but this was a new level of fucked up. Kakashi recalled the dreams where he had been chained up like a dog, but he had never been deprived of his ability to see or speak. The sinister presence that had been in the room with him was worse than the one he associated with Iruka.

Kakashi looked around the barracks still covered in darkness. The few other people that were there with him were still in their beds. He hadn’t woken them.

He didn’t know if he'd be able to handle nightmares worse than the one he just had. Kakashi would have to break into the cell sooner rather than later. Time was slowly running out for them now. He had two choices. Kakashi could slowly go mad from the dreams, break Iruka out without a care for his safety, and die either by Danzo’s hand or Iruka’s. Alternatively—and honestly, Kakashi’s preferred choice—he would break Iruka out on his own terms and they’d both be free of this hell.

He preferred to live.

Kakashi flopped back down, face first on his bed, and laid there as his heart rate slowed.

His exhaustion lulled him back into a fitful, light sleep.


End file.
